comfort.

Trying to make a YouTube video :p

[fxderchen]

The Guilt Of The Wraith

Fanart of the story: ,,In Living Memory" by @ziracona on ao3!

I highly recommend this fic it's awesome, angsty and with a happy ending!

Extra Information:

The scene is set for somewhere in the middle of the story where Wraith feels really guilty about killing them (continuously) while the survivors still reach out for him, seeing him as a friend and hoping that they will find a way out together.

(I used a sketch for the proportions)

[fairycosmos]

the issue with growing up in the 2000s and 2010s was like there was this really big push toward "accepting your weirdness" overall but they meant like idk wearing mismatched socks or something not being tangibly beyond the norm in any way shape or form

[ziracona]

Actually on the subject of Jax’s (lack of a) relationship with Kinger, that’s a super important aspect of the show that I haven’t seen anyone else talk abt so I’m gonna go on Disability in TADC essay time:

Jax has active relationships with everyone in the cast, except Kinger. Definitely some of this relates to how Jax treats people based on gender, but it’s not like Jax never had a male friend. She was tight with Kaufmo for a long time, and even back then, when she was on good terms with everyone, Jax did not really interact with Kinger.

Jax expresses her thoughts on Kinger very dismissively ‘[sarcastic] the two most stable and competent people’ - ‘Kinger’s the crazy one,’ and actively ignores him pretty often (IE when walking off during softball). Her thoughts as expressed with behavior and commentary seem to just be that Kinger is crazy, which makes him not really worth interacting with.

Which is really sad, for both of them.

No one else treats Kinger this way. Zooble and Gangle don’t have as close relationships with him as Ragatha and Pomni, but they clearly care about him and they treat him as a full team member and someone worthy of consideration and full agency and personhood in his life, despite lacking some of his mental faculties. (For example, in Beach Episode, Zooble and Gangle bring up feeling uncomfortable about leaving Kinger in the dark [literally and metaphorically] about Abel & the escape plan, and choose to tell him, which they do without any condescension or simplifying even though he calls them accidentally by the other’s name when they show up & is actively exhibiting the symptoms of Brain Not All There. In comparison, Jax never even brings up including Kinger in this in any way, despite her mistrust of Abel and this being an obvious red flag on his behavior giving her more reasons than usual to care). They include him in their picnic time in the lightning round adventures, and hang out frequently with him. Gangle and Zooble both engage with him like any other party member during the pilot as well, when he and Gangle are trying to save Zooble.

For their part, Ragatha and Pomni actively seek Kinger out and engage deeply with him. Kinger was so broken mentally when he met Ragatha that he didn’t even remember his circus name, but he treated her kindly and did the best he could, and Ragatha recognized correctly that this is a whole person and one very worthy of time and love, despite the disability. Pomni similarly engages with Kinger, and after her getting to know him in episode 3, takes seriously how he tells her it’s okay he’s probably going to forget everything they said and did together, because she will remember it. She’s very aware how mentally disabled he is and how out of his control his own faculties are, but it in no way impacts her treating him as intensely valued and as a whole person worth her time and love. Which he clearly is (one, for free, by being a person. And two, by literally keeping half the cast from abstracting with his emotional support). She and Ragatha both agree in Beach Episode that even though he’s not all there, they trust him more than anyone else including each other, and he means a lot to them. Pomni even feels safest having Kinger choose which button to push, because of how much she trusts his judgement.

Beyond that, Kinger seeks out Ragatha as his buddy and she chooses to hang out and spend time doing his goofy not all there stuff too (like counting his eggs before they hatch). She has been watching Jax abstract party members (she doesn’t know of intentionally or not) and literally chooses protecting him from abstraction, over protecting Pomni in They All Get Guns.

Kinger is as aware of his mental state as everyone else, and isolates himself in his pillow fortress a lot to self cope with the symptoms. But he doesn’t devalue himself or isolate out of some feeling of social inadequacy, and engages to the best of his ability every day and has a lot of fun with the others, and is a great teammate and person to be around. No one (including Caine) in the circus except Jax ever considers ditching Kinger or thinks of him like he isn’t worth the time a ‘normal’ or totally intact person is.

In the finale, when Jax abstracts, they don’t put her in the basement — not just originally, when they can’t, but not when Caine offers to do it either.

They make a massive version of essentially Kinger’s pillow fortress, and sacrifice (literally in Pomni and Zooble’s case) parts of themselves to get her safely into it, so she can self soothe and be okay. When Pomni goes off to face Jax also, she immediately shoots out the lights, because she knows how they affect Kinger (whose mind isn’t totally intact) and remembers how he told her Queenie recovered herself enough to recognize him and calm down and be touched safely after abstraction, when she was in darkness. She never views Jax as an abstraction or as Not Jax or as dead or gone. She is what she is: Jax, but damaged.

This (correct) approach lets her reach Jax and talk to her, until the combination of Jax panicking and lights coming on ejects Pomni.

But it’s so sad, because Jax is going through guilt and a sort of cyber suicide attempt, and a gender crisis, but she’s also going through brain damage/disability. Jax feels unworthy of being loved or saved because of what she’s done, and internalized misogyny, and she thinks it’s too late because of who she has become, but also because she has never viewed the abstractions as still people. Ragatha asks Abel when they talk about escaping, what will ‘happen to the people in the basement’ — not abstractions, people. Clearly people, clearly not dead. Just damaged.

But Jax already has such a complicated and damaged relationship to everything, definitely including personal/human worth, she has never grasped what everyone else has. She’s always been so afraid of being outed and ‘wrong’ and being abandoned and rejected for that, or being unworthy, abstracting is another thing that makes her in her belief dead and not a person and past saving. Even as terrified as she is. She says ‘It’s too late. I did this to myself.’ and she believes that. She has never been enough in her own head, and losing so much of herself in what is already a losing battle, seems like being dead. Being valueless.

But no one else does.

Definitely the majority of Jax’s arc in the finale is about her experience as a trans woman, but a lot of it is about personhood and disability too. Isn’t She Wonderful is definitely playing for Jax as a girl, but a little piece of that is also for Jax even still, as an abstraction.

When the others rescue Pomni, they ask if she was really going to try and take care of Jax on her own. Not deal with, not handle, but take care of—and that’s what they do. They make Jax a home built to suit her disability’s needs, and sacrifice the majority of their former common area for it, along with literal body parts. They make it where they can go visit Jax, and are able to communicate enough they aren’t ever hiding from or afraid of Jax, and Jax is calm. Zooble says Jax ‘better appreciate’ all the arms they burned through getting her to her new house, and they all continue to talk about Jax in the present tense and as a person.

Alone in her mental self-imposed streetlight hell, Jax tells Pomni she isn’t supposed to miss her, or care about her. Because that’s genuinely what Jax believes about herself. But they all do, and they continue to actively seek out and love and spend time around Jax, even though she is now in a state where she can’t physically do most of what she used to, and cannot verbally communicate at all.

And I’m sure Jax comes to a place where she understands that, eventually, but it’s so sad. If she had spent more time with Kinger, she might not have been so terrified, about herself or her future. Because what happened to her was awful, but walking, talking, doing physical activities, communicating, even cognition on your usual human level, is not why any of them cared about Jax, or a bar she had to pass to stay worth loving or wanting to be around.

You get that all show to a smaller degree with Kinger, and then such a higher degree with Jax.

It’s very sweet and very intentional that earlier in that episode, Pomni goes to Kinger for comfort when everyone is falling apart, and he tells her almost exactly what he did before—that she’s very strong. And she feels better and tells him he told her this all before, and he’s surprised. And you don’t know, until that moment in that episode, for sure, if Kinger does or doesn’t remember episode 3. He doesn’t, though. And that’s sad, but it’s also okay. He isn’t sad about it. He just smiles and tells her it’s still true. And she isn’t sad, because he was right, when he told her way back then that it would be okay if he forgot, because she will remember.

And then like 10 minutes later Jax abstracts. And she’s so afraid. Of course she is. As someone with memory issues, any permanent damage to your cognition is fucking terrifying. You do worry, you do feel like less of a person, less you, less real. And you worry, about how other people will react and treat you and think of you. Things don’t have to be true, to terrorize you.

But Pomni’s okay. Jax talks about wishing they’d talked more, and she says ‘so tell me now.’ She treats Jax the same way she treats Kinger, and she’s okay, when she can’t un-abstract Jax. Not because it wouldn’t be amazing and better if Jax was fixed, and not like she will give up trying or it could never work, but because she knows it’s okay even if she never can.

It’s sad, and painful, and it’s better if the damage can be fixed. But it’s still Jax. She’s literally just been in there; she knows it’s still Jax. And it’s okay if it isn’t all of her at the same levels and in the same ways, and it’s okay if she can’t communicate the same, or won’t remember all the times Pomni visits or totally understand right everything Pomni says. It still happens, and it clearly still matters. Jax is still in there. Jax chooses to calmly go with Zooble when they make her a house, and to chill when people come visit.

It’s because the show has made a dedicated statement on people having value not just in spite of flaws or bad past actions or where they come from or even what they are, but also in whatever state they’re in. Pomni tells Gummigoo in ep2 she’s felt like he has when he says he doesn’t matter in the slightest, and she doesn’t want anyone to ever feel that way. Kinger tells Pomni in ep3 that he thinks the most important thing is to make sure people know that they matter, and to cherish your time with them. These conversations are deliberately placed between what at the time is assumed to be a living human, and an NPC, and between a man with brain damage talking about his even more damaged wife who was taken from him against his will /for/ being damaged, and a healthy human.

Jax isn’t in some dream totally unaware of the outside world now. She’s just…not there the same way. But that doesn’t mean she’s gone, or that the others have moved on or want to. The first big change they make to the circus on their own is making Jax a home with them, and their first big change when Caine lets/helps them is to enrich the abstracted people’s lives by making a beautiful dark aquarium for them to fly around in, and with spaces for people to come sit and visit and chill with them so they can be together again. You see Kinger there reading his wife a book about butterflies in the montage, and Pomni visiting them there and visiting Jax in her tent. And it works—it enriches their lives. The jagged edges smooth, and the abstracted people are calm and together.

It doesn’t fix everything. I think someday they will—I definitely hope they will. But the point is that even if they never can, it’s okay. It doesn’t mean everyone is dead, and gone. It doesn’t mean they can’t still have relationships with them or enrich their quality of life. It doesn’t mean they aren’t worth spending time with.

Here is some official art from Glitch to this effect, from 2 days ago:

Together, no matter what.

Anyway. TADC did a lot of things beautifully, but since I have memory issues myself, Kinger has always been special to me. As someone whose college focus was disability studies, it has just been really moving to watch the show handle disability in this way, and I wanted to hear someone talk about it, so here you go.

Caine also has a huge disability arc about being a ‘defective’ AI and his entire self-worth being tied to his abilities, and being more afraid of being rejected for being broken than he is of being rejected for literally torturing people. He worries about how being weaker might change his value when he returns to the Circus, and has to deal with his fear of being hurt for who he is and what’s ’wrong’ with him, vs his reactivity and hurting others to protect himself first. A lot of this also applies to him as an artist and on social levels, but he’s got a disability narrative there too. I gotta stop though this is already too long a post goodnight

[ziracona]

Haven’t cosplayed Quin in a while but broke out my Quentin cosplay for the 10 year anniversary.

[depsidase]

[ziracona]

Hi Ziracona! I havent asked a question in a minute so I figured I'll try to ask some questions and theories this time :)

Oh also! I finished 6 of your works for dbd, new dawn fades is my last one. On deaf ears was really interesting, especially vigos characterization (also Oliver, but he kinda makes me mad cause I just want him to be okay). Other than ILM I find myself rereading half-life so much, cause it has one of my favorite dynamics (everything with Quentin, Min and Anna is my favorite plotline in ilm I'd say :p)

So, first question: who created the refined serum? This is the event add-on for the medkit which consumes the medkit but gives the survivors larger fov and a haste boost for some time. I'd figure it would be made by the entity after Talbot fully succumbs to the serum as a cruel joke, but my other thought would be benedict could probably figure it out considering he had been there for so long and had all the know-how. Of course it could be someone unnamed, Vigo, or I could see claudette too.

Second question, or theory I guess: azarovs soul being trapped inside his spine and skull as Philips weapon. Its something the entity has done before, usually with iridescant add-ons its seen. But it'd be a little bit of emotion it could drain from azarov or Philip.

Third question: what were benedict/Alex/olivers perks? Is it anywhere in the series and I'm just forgetting? Sorry if it's been shown and I'm just being a little slow cause I've been reading so much.

Fourth question, kinda theory: the characters escaping during ILM is the “third escape” the devs referenced forever ago that no one has found out yet

Fifth question: did you use the obsession mechanic for every killer? Like Laurie is always Michaels obsession, but is it the same for other killers? Quentin/min for Anna? Claudette for Philip? Etc etc cause I can give an example for everyone other than like plague.

Sixth question: did the nurse burn down crotus prenn? Did the entity?

Seventh question, also a theory: Alright this ones the most interesting to me so if I'm completely missing the mark I'm gonna feel bad, but since all characters have four perk slots and the teachables associated with the characters are only three, its kinda implied the characters either have an empty slot or another perk. Now looking at the numbers the modern survivors end up at 15, and the general perks (or lost tapes characters) are 14, now feng uses one of bills perks during ILM so I'm going to omit her, but for everyone else do they have the general perks in that last slot? Who gets what? (I have my own guess but id prefer to hear yours if this is true)

Eight question, theory now: the modern survivor cast all got their memory affected/altered by the entity. Before joining the main cast they don't really remember anyone else from the realm, so I think they lose memories of whoever the entity doesnt want them to know of, this could be benedict or other survivors like bill because he is from a different universe. The only exception is nea and kate both remembering benedict and kate also remembering tapp, I'd say this would align with them surviving trials and joining the modern cast shortly after interacting with benedict/tapp (nea joins modern cast after ace even though she got into the realm earlier and kate was also out there for a while so I think they just spent some time out there and survived two trials In a row in comparison to everyone else). Because for the game the characters supposedly lost memories of other survivors after death, I thought it was a neat reference to the game that also gave it some story relevance.

Ninth question, another theory: the entity gave powers to Krueger and Michael. We've seen the entity bestow gifts to the killers before they join the realm such as Lisa and rin, but also these are the only killers to have a token based perk that increases in strength as the trial goes on (aside from huntress because she's the goat or something I don't know) Lisa has devour hope, rin has spirit fury, krueger has fire up and Michael has all of his perks. Now in tome lore its revealed the entity bestows power or evil to a world so that it may suffer and he can pull a character or realm from that (such as the naughty bear series) so it could be assumed the entity gave power to an unknowing Michael Myers and tries to influence him into being evil, and was a lot more transactional or upfront to krueger when it helped him become a dream demon. It's also noted (aside from huntress again because she's the best) that these four killers I believe are some of the strongest during ILM, with a top 5 off the top of my head being: Krueger, Rin, Michael, Anna, Lisa and then Talbot somewhere in there

Tenth question, another theory: Evan Macmillan was a survivor before being a killer during ILM. It just makes so much sense during ILM in comparison to the base game, with killers being able to be perceived as survivors through claudettes empathy or aces luck, but also killers like Susie being able to work on a generator or Vigo convincing Philip he was/could be a survivor (this is how they met right? I think???) aswell as survivors transitioning into killers with Talbot and potentially claudette as it seemed that was what the entity was gearing towards. Now why Evan? Well his base lore and first tome lore describe him completely differently and I think that represents how he thought of himself and his actions before and after becoming a killer in the entitys realm as Evan really did posses a lot of empathy, compassion and kindness that his father never had which was eventually taken from him and it's interesting how he's the first killer to get a direct buff in his actions (brutal strength and agitation) with no prerequisites like the entity is trying to fuel him into enjoying being a killer and becoming this obedient version of his worst self.

Eleventh question or theory: ghostface would've become the entitys favorite in due time and the clown would have/already did lose favor with the entity. Ghostface being bestowed gifts and no maiming by the entity, and the fact that Danny genuinely loves being there makes me think the entity quickly throws clown from the top spot in favor of a new toy.

Thanks so much! Been reading a ton of your works so it's nice to look back and ask a few questions or see if I got a good theory for some things!

Hey! So glad you enjoyed the stories. And yessss, Huntress dynamics are peak. I loved getting to write Vigo for ODE. Credit for Ollie goes to @speckeltail whose oc he is, but very fun writing his disasters ass too.

Ok so re: refined serum. Tragically the answer to several of these questions is going to be ‘that didn’t exist / was not part of canon when I wrote ILM, so it doesn’t have any interplay with my canon,’ including this. Given your description I would guess if I did include it, it would be Vigo, or maybe the survivor doctors (Quin, Claude, and Adam) as a team? Benedict could have too, but I’m not sure he’d have put his focus into it. I don’t have a real answer though, because it didn’t exist yet when I wrote that world, so it doesn’t exist in that world.

As for Azarov, I kind of doubt his soul was there simply because of the time and distance discrepancy between his death and Philip getting snagged, but I could definitely see the Entity lying about it. Not sure if it would have, because that probably would not have had the desired effect on Philip. The only thing the Entity works pretty hard at is manipulating, and it did a lot of leg work to look in line with what Philip expected. Not as hard as it worked on Adiris, but it sure didnt slack.

Ok as for Benedict and Alex’s perks, I did know originally, and I can’t remember offhand if they were 100% general perk originators, or had like two and one each I made up. If it was all gens then I think Alex was Slippery Meat, This is Not Happening, and Resilience. If I had an original in mind it would have taken ‘this is not happening’s slot. Benedict I think was Déjà Vu, Premonition, and We’ll Make It. I remember going over that in my head years ago but it’s been so long I am not 100 on it, but I think it was something like that.

Ollie has his own perk set but I’ll call Speck in to answer this one: @speckeltail you’re up!

I am so out of the loop now I didn’t know they mentioned a third escape, but I mean if it was that would kick ass!

Ok obsession question: As far as like it tying directly into a perk that would benefit the killer from the obsession mechanic, no I did not intend for them all to be running an obsession perk. In a meta way though, absolutely. Just, some of the obsession was less strictly trial mechanical, and more about what the Entity got meal wise out of the trial. Even if say Evan is not running a perk to benefit himself from hunting Min, him obsessing over her absolutely was a tasty side of fries for the eldritch spider. It absolutely catered to this by sending survivors to killers who were especially interested in them, and encouraging this behavior directly and indirectly from killers. You’re definitely right that everyone had favorites and un-favorites to get in their trials, killer or survivor, and thought a whole lot about it.

Did the nurse burn down crotus prenn? Did the entity:

Sally’s rather train wreck of a time was introduced well after ILM, so actually neither of them did. Or I guess, I wrote no intent for that. If one of them had, definitely would have been Entity caused, but her origin was so different at the time that ILM Sally has a bunch of differences from her current canon.

Seventh question/perk questions. Do they have the general perks in that last slot? Who gets what? (I have my own guess but id prefer to hear yours if this is true)

Yes, definitely characters are running a fourth perk. Min has borrowed time like you mention. They definitely know general perks and some use them, but a lot of them are running a perk borrowed from another survivor, in ILM. Adam I believe is shown using balanced landing in Speak for the Dead, after learning it from Nea. Min learns Urban Evasion and sometimes uses it. (It’s meant to be implied that perks can be swapped out like in game, so survivors have more than 4 at their disposal). Laurie, Tapp, Adam, and David explicitly hold classes to teach some of their perks, and since Laurie is consistently referred to by others as one of the best medics (after the actual medic classes), it’s implied she has learned and is using a medic perk in her last slot. I am happy to go through w the whole squad, but any change I could read your guesses first? OuO

Memory question: so Nea arriving after Ace is based on release order.

I know the devs added their ridiculous ‘they forget whenever they die’ but that makes writing any piece of fiction impossible because you cannot have character development if your entire cast is routinely set to 0 with no * to give you some leeway. That addition was made well after ILM and I ignore it because I think it’s stupid haha, so it doesn’t have any bearing on my stuff.

As for if the survivors got their memories messed with at all though? Probably a little. Not like edited or deleted like Philip—way too high effort. I just think the realm is designed to make it easy to forget if you aren’t trying not to. Makes time seem less real. Most survivors had been in trials with Benedict, but since they never spoke to him, I think just how the realm works made it easy to forget his face, if not the interaction. Like a store full of people. After you leave, chances are 98% you don’t remember the face of at all, even if you passed them a few times. Realm just kind of eases one into accelerating natural human memory loss and poor retention, to make it harder to unionize and harder to meticulously record things like time and specific events.

Ninth question!

Absolutely the Entity gave powers to Michael and Krueger. It did not make either of them though.

Tomes didn’t exist at all yet when I wrote ILM, so in general they won’t have anything to do with how I wrote my world or people, and mine is not a multiverse world like canon DBD is. There’s just innately a lot of discrepancies now because of how different those world ideas are.

Michael was his own brand of bizarre in the world, and got snagged, then given slightly more specific abilities or edited abilities in-realm against his will. Freddy became a demon on his own, and was snagged against his will, but got a very upfront power edit. He resents the Entiry for being a more powerful entity than himself.

I try to stick to the canon of the media crossed over, so things like TCM or NOES or Halloween are totally in line with their existing canon, and only branch when the entity shows up. No causality. The original kind of Entity world lore was the idea it could only reach our world through weak spots created by murders and mass violence, and that’s why it appears where it does, more than like a causal ‘it made so and so do this in order to make it in.’ Though ofc there are times it absolutely does that, like Rin’s dad, or Sally. Just, I wouldn’t say it’s the Entity’s default. Does when it can, makes do when it cannot.

Very interesting lineup of top killers! Krueger, Rin, Michael, Anna, Lisa and then Talbot. I agree with the first four, but I don’t think Lisa or Talbot would take top billing, and Philip deserves a slot up there. He’s the tactical fighter niche but he’s in that top 5; he earned it.

Question 10!

Ah, Evan. His OG backstory was so different, so again this is gonna be an ‘actually this just didn’t exist at the time’ answer. He was a lot less complex and more just kind of a dick and hunting for sport in his OG lore, which is where I got the Evan I have.

Him (tome / even just original rewrite Evan) being a survivor would be super interesting, for someone writing multiverse world. I don’t personally love the ‘multiples of the same survivor exist’ thing, but young adult and teen Evan is so different from snagged-by-the-Entity-Evan in his tome version, even I have to admit you could get some good drama out of that.

(As for Vigo and Philip, sort of lol. He did not convince Philip he was a survivor, he just mistook him for one.)

Ghostface question:

That’s such an interesting point! Definitely likely. It would maybe depend on if he too could be tempted to collaborate with Freddy. Hmmmmmm. God the Entity would have been so done with Nightmare if he caused problems with /both/ its faves. Definitely a very strong possibility!

You’re welcome, and thanks for asking! Sorry so much just won’t tie in because of when I created my DBD world compared to when tomes began to be a thing. Glad you’ve had fun reading though, and always happy to hear from you.

: )

[comfort1]

This isn’t half my screenshots of notes 😭

[ziracona]

Hello! Quick questions while I'm thinking about a chapter, is there a religious symbolism in ILM? The idea of faith being presented as this ‘angel on your shoulder’ type narrative. Where the characters ultimately are assisted by a force almost none of them know but helps them anyway. To me I caught this when I was reading Adam creating his story, it reminded me of religious texts where the god of the religion saw its followers making a story/book in honor of them. I mean Adams story is evocative of vigos role in the narrative so it holds some similarities.

Aside from that! Is there anything different from the start of ILM to the start of the game? Because from my eyes the only difference before the story starts !spoilers! Is that Vigo (and Alex) die to Philip, In comparison to the game where Vigo is the only known character to escape the realm. It reminded me of the show arcane, where a character is sent to another reality where two characters have passed away and the entire world is seemingly in a better place. I mean comparing the game where Vigo is the only known person to escape, and the story where Vigo is happy to have taken this role to assist the person he loves most, while also being one of the few to not get a happy ending. I don't want it to come off as Vigo being gone makes the world better! He helps the characters throughout the story and the more important piece is his death to Philip separates him from characters like Rin and Lisa who sacrifice their humanity for strength, because for Vigo in your story I think what mattered most to him by that point was his relationships to others and not the power he could achieve.

Uhm if I'm crazy then I've been looking into stuff too much, but if I'm not then I'm very happy I found a new and interesting set of interpretations for your work even after like 8 reads. Thank you for always answering!

Of course! Thanks as always for asking!

Okay so for part one, the religious symbolism question. Is there religious symbolism? Probably, intentionally or not. If I look at it now, I’d say the world has some strong parallels to Mik’maq religious views. Really though, there is meant to be what you want to take from it. Faith can be a beautiful or terrible thing, as can atheism, depending on how the person takes their belief and turns it towards their behavior, or even internalizes it. I don’t want to ever push a specific religious pov, but I also don’t want to ever act like I think a specific faith is incorrect. I don’t know the truth, as no one does; that’s why faith is called faith. If I write a religious character (IE Quentin, Philip, Adiris) I try to write from their pov as if what they believe is probably true, but this goes for every time I switch characters so there is no overarching faith line. I think that ILM very much supports Quentin’s ‘I just hope you believe there is something that lasts and matters in this world, even if it’s just your love for other people’ sentiment in Nearly Departed. Same for Philip’s prayer in Memento Mori. That’s how it’s meant to read. Things matter; maybe there is a big something out there and maybe not, but no matter what else is true, we matter because we happened, and we are real. Even death and memory loss, even if in another time no one remembers us, we lived, and even god cannot take that away. And we loved, and nothing can take that away either, whatever comes next, even if what comes next is nothing. It was real, and it mattered, and it cannot be undone.

Okay as for Vigo! When ILM was written, it was totally canon-compliant. But of course updates occur and rewrites happen with BHVR, and they created the tomes. There was not an intentional deviation from canon (IE even Alex had no confirmed gender when I began writing), but there is now of course a large deviation in several areas. But I like my world. Uhhh things that are different. I got a lot of lore right, but I think I was off on Lisa’s time by about 20 years. And I wrote before DBD became a multiverse, so that is different. Those are the things that immediately come to mind.

You’re very right about my Vigo. He did care more about those around him than his power. ILM-verse Vigo was a very interesting man. I have mentioned before that his goal was to escape the realm, and he fails, and Philip’s originally was just to stay a good person, and he sort of fails (for a while, at least from an outside perspective as he is a killer), but Philip finishes Vigo’s arc for him, and Vigo, by keeping a record of Philip and his motives and heart and the helping him find the truth again, completed Philip’s arc for him. Love those men.

Vigo and Philip have a very complex narrative setup and relationships and I would absolutely love to talk more but I’m about to be helping vend a booth so gtg for the moment! All this to say yes. It’s not Vigo being dead that makes the world better, but Vigo choosing other people and the risk that carries, over himself, does make the world much, much better. It usually does. ^u^

[ziracona]

Hi Ziracona. Do any of the characters or scenes in ‘in living memory’ have an associated song?

I've been looking for some and for an example I think ‘not a lot, just forever’ fits Vigo so well. And I went to explain and record it in a 15 minute video, and by minute 7 I start crying and I think I cry again at minute 14ish??? Anyways what I'm getting at, there's a lot of comparisons to him and his relationship with the whole cast and especially Philip in that song. Is there anything similar for you?

Oh yeah, god I had huge playlists. I can dig them up and share them sometime if you want, but I’ll give the ones that still immediately come to mind.

If a song was mentioned in a scene (like Midnight Train’s many numbers, or the songs Susie plays, or Escape in the episode where Philip and Meg dance), it was part of that playlist.

For other ones, I listened to Sunflower, Dark Night & Kara’s theme exclusively in Dawn, and the first and last are common Claudette songs to me. (Dark Night was for Benedict)

For the Frank part of 600 Seconds, it was just MCR’s I Don’t Love You the entire several hours of writing.

Philip got his own instrumental theme I listened to a lot—actually, he and Vigo both got a theme, and a fight theme. Philip’s were Second Son from Infamous Second Son (I must have heard it about 8million times now) and Martial Law from the same game. Vigo’s were both from Furi, with ‘Danger’ being his main, and ‘What We Fight For’ his fight theme. I really enjoyed that both games have heavy traditional/indigenous writing, with extremely modern equipment, so you get this great mix of tradition and techno. Also, those are all just amazing songs, and incredible sound tracks in general.

For The Tower I think I mentioned in the chapter notes that I listened to the instrumental for Heather’s song ‘Dead Girl Walking’ (which I ironically did not listen to at all in the chapter I named after it). For Laurie, I also listened to this unsettling and sad track from H20 called ‘Decapitated’ that plays during that one really sweet and sad moment between Laurie and Michael at the end. Made my own extended for it.

I listened to Burn Bright by MCR for several gay makeout/sex scenes, and Twin Shadow’s Eclipse for the Dwight/Jake scene in the hatch tunnels.

I listened to Mystery Skulls’ Paralyzed for the Meg-Frank fight in Ormond. Lyrically it makes absolutely no sense but man the beat and vibe was great for the energy.

I listened to Last Stardust while writing all of Going Home and Season’s End (although I did also listen to Going Home and Season’s End during that chapter so I guess it only felt like the whole time because I cried to it so much…)

There is a Lindsey Sterling song called ‘Moon Trance’ that I listened to for the end of VS.

I think of Set It Off’s “Dancing with the Devil” as the theme song for that story in general, because if it had been a TV show I could have created the most god-tier opening (that changed as the story evolves) to it. I now every mental frame by heart.

I listened to I’m Still Here during quite a few Meg chapters.

Then I also had a lot of music for brainstorming, but that’s a lot more like character playlists than actively during-story writing. Like, It Takes Two from Into the Woods is perfect for Parkfield, and Inkpot Gods by The Amazing Devil gives great VigOjomo. Some of my playlist stuff got used though, because I definitely listened to like 3 Wombats songs writing MiNea chapters, especially Give Me A Try, and I listened to Greek Tragedy by them for some of the real pining Susie chapters.

I could give you a lot, but this is already a lot, so I’ll cut it here. Except to say that I do this any time I write, and if you’re looking for music, Speck (who I wrote On Deaf Ears for) send me a song called Awake at Night by Half Alive for it, and that’s a great tragedy with a lot of emotion and struggle to it song.

But yeah I totally do and I love that you do! And I’ll check out that song now 👀 for sure

[guppy2703]

Average A ReGect episode:

[blioc]

The sillies

[ziracona]

While doing more notes and rewrites through the 20s I remember Chapter 64-66 through David’s perspective is essentially:

My friends get married

we get drunk and I’m told the big spider wants to hurt me specifically really bad

My friend dies???

Everyone’s in auto haven

Attack the spirit (she’s top 3 killers in the verse btw)

Watch the spirit fly and evicerate another killers weapon, then she leaves

Quentin’s mom hits me with a hatchet and goes to kill me for a second

Go off and kill the clown with my bestie

Run back to my 2 crushes and now fighting Freddy Krueger (another top 3 killer in the verse)

A lot of crazy stuff happens

Knocked out

Wake up to Michael Myers (also top 3) being here

Nea doesn’t have a leg, the nurse is with us now and Philip is alive

I gotta save Susie and three of her friends who want to kill me and have tried to kill me before

somehow pull them into a moving truck

YAY we got out of hell ❤️

Truck crashes

Wake up in snow

Quentin’s sad and kind of dying but Kruegers dead?

Now I have to disarm Quentin’s mom while she tries to kill me (huntress is top 4 killers in verse)

A cop almost shoots me.

If I got something wrong I will be very sad

Oh and since this is a question I’ll ask: did Vigo create the golden toolbox in your verse? (In game the golden toolbox is an Easter egg on most maps and a quote from Vigo talks about missing his better tools so it’s assumed)

Anyways I always have a ton of questions I can ask and thank you very much!

Hadfksksks David does have a top 5 experience of that night doesnt he. He’s doing everything. Man doesn’t get as much credit because he’s running tank for 8 different parties instead of running his own arc but he is such a team carry. That’s pretty much his arc. I’d add having the impulse to kiss Adam for the 2nd time and then his girl crush being unwilling to kiss him in the same 10 minutes as one he remembers too.

As for the Golden Toolbox, in my version of the world all toolboxes stem from Alex, who brought hers and made the toolbox items exist for everyone because of her skills and personality. Vigo definitely used her best toolboxes, and got a lot of use out of them, but she was the point of origin.

[notsolonedesert]

Oh Kinger, the girl dad you are

[zmpl]

has anyone noticed that after the porn ban of 2018 tumblr was essentially killed from the mainstream and everyone flocked to other social media sites like twitter and meta. then those sites got enshittified to where twitter became Nazi Central and meta sites had an entire meme around getting “zucced” aka mark zuckerberg himself would ban you for saying a no-no word like fuck. and then the mainstream shifted to tiktok where infamous toddlerspeak sentences like “he got unalived by a pew pew” were born because if you once again say a no-no word like kill or gun or any other word that isn’t corporate i mean kid friendly then the algorithm will bury your post into the ground. and somehow we’ve come full circle and tumblr is now the most bearable social media site because although we can’t have female presenting nipples we can at least talk to each other like adults. has anyone noticed that at all or is it just me and the flaming skull

[comfort1]

Just ran out of tape so I can’t hang up a poster I spent two hours on. (This is devastating news)

[chryza]

Dear video essay creators. A video analysis is when you analyze a piece of media. No no look at me. A summary, no matter how thorough, is not an analysis. An analysis requires you to draw conclusions about the media such as authorial intent, real-world parallels, discussion about themes/worldbuilding/character motivation, and so much more. You have to stop summarizing something and saying that’s analysis. The Gaylors are doing more critical analysis than you. Is that who you want to lose to? The gaylors?

[sylviii]

don't make me get out the dang pyramid

[ziracona]

Hi Ziracona! I haven’t asked a question in a week ish I think? I’ve made a ton of progress and I can show soon enough but importantly I have some questions I hope you can answer!

I don’t know your name or pronouns and I really don’t want to come off as rude during the video! For now I’ve stuck to just referring to you as Ziracona and using they/them pronouns. Also if there’s anything you want to share that I can put in the video I’d be happy to hear it :)

Another question is: during in living memory after the characters in the realm escape; what are their ages? I know we had chapter 45 (I think) say what everyone thinks/feels they are and since the realm works off of perception and such that can be true. But what about characters like Sally, Anna and Benedict? Did I miss their ages I’m sorry if I did! If I guessed I’m pretty sure Micheal would just be the same age as when he showed up; and everyone who stated their ages during chapter 45 is their perceived age.

Aside from that I guess I can ask a question about another theory. So vigo still could perceive the characters even once they got out the realm; and the nightmare never died until the last bit of the entity left the world (the portal closing was when he suddenly burns right?). So if Vigo still had some connection through the realm to see everyone and the nightmare staying alive until the portal closes is good evidence; is it safe to say aces perk up the ante was active for longer than perceived?

Alright let me give some reasoning for up the ante specifically; so that’s aces luck perk which is stronger based on how may survivors are alive with you during the trial. Now killers during ILM can be seen similarly as “teammates” or “allies” during several points (Philip unhooks Dwight, Susie works on a generator, Claudette reads Micheal’s aura as an ally with her perk empathy). Now ace perceiving everyone in the truck as an ally is really important as up the ante is the only perk to stack higher and higher based on how many teammates you have; so hypothetically it was strongest during the end of chapter 65 and during chapter 66 when everyone was nearby.

Up the ante works on a scale of 3% more luck per ally so it could go up to a ridiculous number considering there’s what 23 people in the truck? 24 if ace counts Anna under that “ally” category.

Now the main evidence against ace keeping the perk longer than others is that everyone else either can’t or doesn’t try to use their perks they had in the realm. But I feel like if anyone could believe hard enough or bluff his was into holding onto his luck longer than anyone it’d be ace.

Also I don’t know if it’s indented but aces situation during chapter 66 would work really well with this; during chapter 20 (and how ace views his situation) he states that he’s lucky but fated poorly, and during chapter 66 he’s in the worst position out of anyone (he’s stuck under the truck having to convince pig not to murder tapp or drag anyone back to the realm while the truck is also catching on fire and others are in the radius to die) BUT he also is lucky in that his bluffing lasts long enough for everyone to end up surviving. Does that make sense? Sorry if I messed up the wording that was kinda long and thank you!

First off, never apologize for leaving an author a long message. Nothing, genuinely nothing, brings more joy.

Ok so re gender and name no worries! I usually just go by Ziracona or Zira for AO3. R is fine too. I’m omnigender, so whatever pronouns are fine. They’re all accurate at some point. They/them works.

For things to share, do you just mean like a message? I guess just a thank you to anyone who has read and gotten something out of the story, especially anyone who has left me a message or comments or posts or Art. It was a really important project to me, and it means a lot other people found value and importance in it too.

As for Ages:

Sally I think was basically the age she went in, since she did not perceive time passing much. Anna similarly would be only a few years older. She is in her late thirties. Benedict had more information than them, and knew time passed, so he aged some, but obviously not in proportion to reality. He’s older, like 56-58? He’s a lot younger when he knows Philip, but the events of Signifying Nothing break him, and he aged drastically after. Not sure of any of their exact ages, because none of them know them either.

Michael has a concrete answer. He would not have aged at all, because he did not perceive time passing, except Laurie did. Being her big brother was such a huge part of his identity and obsession, once she caught up to his age, he aged slowly with her so he remains exactly one year older than her.

Correct in the guess that everyone is the age they decide in 45, with two exceptions. Quentin and Claudette both give an answer they don’t believe in. Quentin does this because he wants to be 25, and still Nancy’s age, but knows he isn’t. He hopes 24 can become true if he tries to believe it. Claudette does this because she is looking at it as a math equation, and 24 would be her age given the years she has been gone, even if she does not feel that age. I think both actually feel and thus are 22 at the time of Many More, but age to 23 by the November the group escapes. Everyone else gives an accurate answer, although Laurie I think would turn 27 pretty damn fast after returning.

-

Omg but that read about Ace. Oh you’re cooking very top chef

So this isn’t text but fantastic read—Yeah, people’s abilities are still in plan until the gate shuts. Less so for people who would perceive reality as totally different (Jeff for example, who had been there very little time and compares it to the fake world set in The Truman Show) more for those there longer in general who began to see less difference between reality and realm (ie David, who refused to ever accept it had different rules and live by them).

It’s like, gone if you let it be, lingering if you cling to it.

Ace is the person it would apply most to of the survivors, as his view of reality even pre-realm was different than average and more tied to concepts like will and luck and fate. He’s the only stranger Vigo comments in first person over when getting their highlight chapters, because Vigo relates to his way of relating to the world. So for sure, Ace had that luck stat up by a good 69% (for accurate stats and for the meme). This is probably a big part of why there are no allied casualties in that chapter. Although I want to definitely express it’s not that his luck carried them, it’s that every single one of them fought and loved and believed and tried with everything they had, and that let the team uncle send a little luck their way to help them cross the finish line. Much like Vigo has been trying to do with the little energy or support he could offer in death, to Philip and for years then the survivors as well: Ace is a very under-appreciated pillar of the OG team. He doesn’t show up or seem to hold up as much as them, but that’s because he doesn’t—but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t contribute as much. The OG four are pillars of the team (the life, the protector, the leader, the healer), Ace steps back but supports all four of them, and others as they join. Jane is right to criticize him for not taking a more active role in some of the especially bad stuff, when he’s one of the eldest, and a paternal figure to a lot of people, but with most of his life experience there, he really carries a lot for those around him, in a lot of ways. He’s awkward at a few things and bad at organization and leadership, but he’s fantastic at almost every conceivable kind of support.

(And yes! Nightmare should have died years ago after Quentin’s dad and Nancy did 87 ghost cleansing rituals on his corpse, but since the Entity’s realm is outside common Earth’s time/is a pocket world, time did not ‘catch up to him’ until his belonging to a world outside time now was completely cut off.)

Also, Ace has the strongest perk abilities after they enter reality again, but he’s not the only one who shows signs of some lingering ability in 600 seconds. >;3

[comfort1]

This isn’t exactly all of it but it’s a decent portion of some of my notes through posters, you can still see the three notebooks and laptop/ipad.